Well, here we are in Germany. Definitely scorchio with temperatures at 34 degrees C outside and 38 inside the van. Having arrived in Dover for a midnight crossing on Wednesday night, we were allowed onto an earlier ferry. Travelling at night saved us £50 on the daytime fare which we thought was well worth it. We then filled up with fuel at Calais (1.32 Euro a litre), another saving worth having. There was no traffic at all and as Mike was wide awake he continued to drive all the way to within an hour of our destination. I wasn't so alert and fought waves of sleepiness with my head lolling around, doing my neck no good whatsoever. Once we both got too tired to carry on we put our heads down for a few hours at a motorway rest area in the Netherlands, near Arnheim. We don't usually travel at speed, preferring to take in the daytime views, but for a change we just thought we'd go for it as we'd set our hearts on a few days R and R in an area we're familiar with.

We are parked at the marina in Emmerich Am Rhein, having taken advantage of the 20 euro 3 night deal. This includes 4 Amp electricity, water and waste dump and luckily with Amps like that we don't need a lot of power. This Stellplatz is featured in the Bord Atlas book (see link above) and we stayed here a year or two ago.

I was asked last week how we kept cool in the van without air conditioning. My answer was to take advantage of the breeze, with windows and doors open. The Germans and Dutch parked here with us keep their blinds down all day, to block out the sunlight-but that wouldn't suit us-too gloomy. The awning has been deployed and we are taking advantage of the shade. My Mum always says that air conditioning makes people bad tempered in the heat because they can't acclimatise. Perhaps we ought to have an on line poll. We're not bad tempered-Mike has done a wash load and I am pottering- with a smattering of expired thunderbugs embedded in the sun lotion applied several hours ago. Looking forward to the cool shower tonight-another measure to help combat the heat. A cockerel woke us up early from his perch in the small petting zoo type area on the stellplatz.

Germany is covered by a very extensive cycle network and this region takes particular pride in theirs. From our waterside location we can cycle into town where there is a lovely promenade front facing the Rhine. The bars have great views of the river and the assorted boats, barges loaded with all different types of cargo. We saw all this a bit sooner than we anticipated yesterday when the Garmin took us through the pedestrianised town centre. Another reminder for us that around towns we're better off using our eyes and our common sense, rather than a Sat Nav.